POTTSTOWN — With a unanimous vote, Police Chief Mark Flanders became Borough Manager Mark Flanders Tuesday night when council unanimously appointed him to the post and unanimously awarded him a one-year contract that nets him $120,000 and four weeks vacation.

Flanders will also remain the police chief until his official retirement in April, however he will not earn two salaries, Borough Solicitor Charles D. Garner Jr. explained.

“For the one salary, you get both jobs,” Garner said.

Prior to the vote, each council member carefully and quietly enumerated their reasons for supporting Flanders’ candidacy, several of them saying they were impressed with the way he had handled the job since July.

Advertisement

That’s when he was named interim borough manager, filling in for the departing Jason Bobst, who left to take the township manager job in West Norriton.

After the vote, Flanders said “I want to thank the councilors for their faith and entrusting me with the future of the borough. I mean to continue us on the path that we’ve already started. I believe Pottstown is on its way to a vibrancy we haven’t seen in a while,” he said.

Although his selection was not official until the vote, and no name was included on the agenda for the night’s meeting, The Mercury reported Sunday that Flanders was the likely choice.

Although there was a crowd at the meeting, only two speakers publicly addressed council on the matter of his appointment, neither mentioning Flanders by name.

Activist Katy Jackson said the public had been excluded from the selection, saying “it’s difficult to support your decisions when we can’t trust you or the process.”

She said people in Pottstown are ready to join together on a common path “but we are growing weary of fighting the petty battles.”

Council President Stephen Toroney deliberately outlined the process council went through ever since May, when Bobst announced his intention to resign.

A search committee including himself, Council Vice President Jeff Chomnuk, Councilman Joe Kirkland and Borough Authority Member David Renn, along with Garner, was appointed.

Then council hired David Woglom, a former Quakertown borough manager and now executive director of the Meyner Center for Local Government at Lafayette College, to help conduct a search for Bobst’s replacement.

The salary range of $115,000 to $130,000 was approved Aug. 8 and more than 55 people applied, with the applications being whittled to 12 by Sept. 18.

By Sept. 22, the number of candidates was down to five and interviews of the final three, at which all members of borough council were present, were held on Oct. 1.

The conditional offer to Flanders was made the next day, said Toroney, who added that now that council has made its choice public, Woglom told him Flanders was his choice as well.

The other public speaker Tuesday night was Jeff Smith, the former codes department director.

Smith told council “in general, there’s a few things that whoever you appoint, in my opinion, they should have; which would be a high moral reputation, a high ethical reputation, not only in serving our community, but in their personal life.”

As an aside, ho added, “obviously I have none of those, that’s why I didn’t apply. So if you guys can answer yes to all those questions, then by all means vote in the person that you think is most qualified,” said Smith. “Personally, (I think) maybe you need to table the vote for another month to gather some more information.”

At least one other person in the audience attempted to address council once the motion to appoint Flanders had been made, but Toroney cut him off saying the man had missed his chance. The speaker, who did not identify himself, was escorted out of the meeting by police when he continued to speak. (See story below).

For their part, council members could not seem to say enough about how much they believed Flanders to be the best choice.

Kirkland said Flanders was “not my original choice,” but said after he considered Flanders’ “wealth of knowledge about the borough and the authority” he came around. “I do feel ultimately we came up with the right candidate.”

“He knows this borough, he knows this staff and I am very confident in his ability to lead,” Kirkland said. “His familiarity with the staff is unprecedented, and experience can be gained over time.”

Councilwoman Carol Kulp said she has had her eyes opened in her 11 months on council.

“People think anyone can do this job, but this is not a walk in the park. If you don’t have the education or experience behind you, it’s impossible.”

Councilman Travis Gery, who was appointed to his seat at about the same time Bobst was leaving, said “I did not come to this decision with any pre-conceived notions and it was clear to me in that interview that Mr. Flanders was the right person and has a passion for the borough of Pottstown.”

Councilman Dan Weand, who heads council’s finance and administration committee, said council “had the luxury of watching Mr. Flanders work on a day-to-day basis” in the job for which he was applying, and that was what made it evident to him that Flanders was the right man for the job.

Councilman Mark Gibson said no matter who council chose, someone would be unhappy.

“You’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t,” said Gibson. “I’ve been here eight years and this will be our fourth borough manager and I saw all three take a beating from the public.”

Council’s choice, Gibson said “is what is best for the borough, not what’s best for certain individuals. Like I said, not everybody is going to be happy.”

But Mayor Bonnie Heath was.

“I feel you just blew the doors off the whole thing,” she told council.

“We don’t have time to waste” and a new candidate unfamiliar with Pottstown and the many quirks of its operations “would need a year to catch-up,” she said.

Instead, she said, council chose a manager known for “tight consistency and discipline, who has earned the respect of the people he works with.”

Renn told council that “I have many, many years of management experience, of hiring and firing people” and that Flanders is “clearly the top choice and I stand behind him 100 percent.”

The contract is a raise of nearly $20,000 for Flanders, although for more than four months, he will be doing two jobs.

Flanders was paid $100,425 in 2011, and declined a pay increase in 2012.

When he first took the chief’s job in 2001, his pay was $67,000 per year.

In addition to his duties as chief, and now borough manager, Flanders is an adjunct professor for Montgomery County Community College’s criminal justice program, a post he has held for 14 years and the team commander for 15 years of the Ches-Mont Emergency Response Team

Prior to his appointment as chief, Flanders held the captain’s post for nearly four years.

He was a patrol sergeant from 1992 to 1996 and an officer on the street for more than 13 years.

His replacement in the captain’s post, Rick Drumheller, is also a likely candidate to be his replacement behind the chief’s desk.

Tuesday night, council also unanimously approved starting the civil service commission process to line up candidates for the captain’s job.

“We’ll probably be filling a vacancy there as we move to find a new police chief,” Toroney said.

About the Author

Evan Brandt has worked for The Mercury since November 1997. His beat includes Pottstown, the surrounding townships and the Pottstown and Pottsgrove school districts, as well as other varied general topics like politics, the environment and education. Reach the author at ebrandt@pottsmerc.com
or follow Evan on Twitter: @PottstownNews.